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I am posting this because it gives short descriptions of books/films relevant to us. This could be useful if someone is considering reading/viewing a book/film/etc. and would like some information. Or, if nothing else, this is of historical interest as it relates to us. This is from a defunct Google Groups site. Shouldn't this be on BoyWike and Newgon.net? https://groups.google.com/g/can.motss/c/cREKtj6gzMo Books On Man Boy Love For Sale Roy Radow Viewed 159 times 15 march 1997, 9:00:00 Books relating to man boy love are now available from Ariel's Pages. Here is an newly UPDATED (March 14, 1997) and EXPANDED version of their listing. I know the people at Ariel's Pages and they are quite legitimate. I am not personally involved in this service however and am only posting this list FYI. Any comments you may have regarding this booklist should be sent to them (I did not write these descriptions). They would also be interested in any additional books that you could recommend. Yours in Liberation, Roy -- Roy Radow * Now: ra...@netcom.com * (was: r...@panix.com) North American Man/Boy Love Association -For membership info & brochure write to: NAMBLA, Dept. RR, PO Box 174, Midtown Station, NYC, NY 10018. Send $5 a for sample Bulletin. Publications list available upon request. Ariel's Pages PO Box 2487 New York, NY 10185-2487 Ariel's Pages works hard to bring you books you won't find anywhere else. We offer the best in fiction, magazines featuring the works of outstanding photographers and artists, non-fiction that dares to tell the truth that's so often suppressed and tales of sex and romance around the world. Because so many of the books we sell are from independent publishers or limited press runs, books often go out of print. Too often, once gone they are never available again. So don't hesitate to purchase books you really want. (This is especially true of the Acolyte Press and Coltsfoot titles; since the death of Acolyte Press founder Frank Torey, the books are in short supply, and once the current stock is exhausted, we will be unable to re-supply.) Please have patience with items on back-order. We sometimes have to deal with several different distributors to find books, and this can take some time. Also note that material shipped from Europe (like Koinos magazine) usually takes at least 6 weeks to arrive here. We apologize for delays and appreciate your understanding. All books are softcover unless otherwise noted, and all prices include postage (via first class mail for customers in the United States). If you want express service by Federal Express, add $20 to your order. Please note: Federal Express does not deliver to post office boxes, and this service is not available for customers outside the United States. **ACOLYTE PRESS BOOKS** Acolyte Press was the world's best known publisher of man/boy love literature. With the death of Frank Torey this past year Acolyte Press has ceased operations. When our current supply of these books is gone, there will be no replacements. Among the books listed below are also a few very rare, long-out-of-print titles from Coltsfoot Press (predecessor to Acolyte) which we were lucky to obtain in limited quantity. The Acolyte Readers Series. In the long-running Acolyte Reader series, the short story format allows for an impressive variety in each volume. Every book includes serious authors of short fiction and masters of erotic prose including Kevin Esser, Luis "Miguelito" Fuentes, Hakim Bey and Robert Campbell. They also comprise less realistic pieces that really deserve the name fairy tales: everybody lives happily ever after. Acolyte Reader Six (192 pp) Bob Henderson's warmly romantic piece demonstrates why it's so hard for some men to stop loving boys: there are just too many of them waiting to be loved. Hakim Bey's "Yohimbe Poems" weave dances with words, remembering two boys loved by the poet, and Jacques de Brethmas performs a comic turn with a boy at his most intriguingly deceitful. Order AR6, $15.50 Acolyte Reader Seven (192 pp) Alan Edwards updates an ancient Spanish coming of age ritual in one story and explores the confluence of locomotion and eroticism in another; I.L. Ingels turns up the heat in a tale of a 13-year-old who cruises the beaches in search of a lover. Order AR7, $15.50 Acolyte Reader Nine (192 pp) Jotham Lotring's "Night Ride" reveals the subtle erotics possible on a cross-country bus trip, and Christopher Monteriano filters the effects of family friendships on a delicately blossoming love affair with a 15-year-old. In Mark Derby's "Not Again," a schoolboy stigmatized for one same-sex attraction finds in his next relationship with a boy the strength to stand up to an abusive teacher. Order AR9, $15.50 Acolyte Reader Ten (192 pp) I.L. Ingles imagines the developing relationship between a teen-age boy and his Japanese captor in a World-War-II interment camp, and B.J. Freedman chronicles the leisurely growth of affection between a runaway teenager and a rock-and-roll drummer. Other tales are set in New Zealand, Mexico and Scotland in perhaps the most international collection of Acolyte stories. Order AR10, $15.50 Acolyte Reader Eleven (192 pp) Kevin Esser's "Santo Domingo" is full of incident and emotion: love and betrayal, passion, the threat of death and the promise of renewal. B.J. Freedman's "Brian's Dick" is a considerably lighter story of the young narrator's frustrating months-long campaign to get a peek at the title object. In "Rocky," a lonely retired schoolteacher loves a boy and loses him, but receives a special gift. Order AR11, $15.50 Acolyte Reader Twelve (192 pp) The final volume of the Acolyte Reader series presents the work of several authors familiar from earlier volumes as well as contributions from some newcomers. The boys in the stories range in ages from ten to fifteen: American, English, Spanish, South African and Turkish boys, presented in tales that make use of cultural details to create moods of romance and humor. Order AR12, $15.50 Attic Adolescent, by Bob Henderson (Coltsfoot Press, 240 pp) Did paederasty die with the Ancient Greeks? Not if Bob Henderson's account of the country in the mid 70s is any indication. This book of interconnected short stories and one novella recounts the amorous adventures of an incurably romantic expatriate. Andreas, Takis, Pavlos, Achilles, Nikos, Stelios, Stavros and Spiros are all loved and all different. Some are street-wise hustlers, others bourgeois schoolboys; some of Henderson's passions are fleeting and others stretch for years. A sexy and sensitive account. Order HAA, $22.00 Crowstone, by Hakim (Coltsfoot Press, 382 pp) This sword-and-sorcery tale has developed a legendary status with both boy-lovers and science fiction fans because for many years it's been almost impossible to find. On the fairest of the moons of Algol, a monk/thief meets a wandering warrior in a fight against air-pirates; they band together in a quest that introduces them to a score of boys: Jethael greatest of the Temple dancers; blond Xiri of Thurenian blood; tattooed Dragon from the Chromatic wastes, Ravinian the voyeur; and pig-tailed sorcerer Varonael. Order BCR, $22.00 Explosion, by l.L. Ingles (Acolyte Press, 384 pp) Inspired by "Lord of the Flies," I.L. Ingles created this novel of a mixed group of black and white boys surviving in an African cave after a nuclear war has devastated the earth. The boys build their own society with a set of rules, but contradictions grow up immediately. Clothes, they soon realize, are more trouble than they're worth, but the casual nudity makes challenges to the prohibition against "playing sex" inevitable. The struggle over sex becomes an emblem of the battle between freedom and custom, between a past that conjured the disaster that left the boys by themselves and a future that demands they create traditions of their own. Order IEX $21.95 The Fire-Worshiper, by Alan Edward (Acolyte Press, 192 pp) Imagine what it would be like today if the old pagan religions of Europe had not just survived the on-rush of Christianity but prevailed. Alan Edward has created such an alternate world. England in this tale is a happy place, a society of advanced but semi-pastoral people where talented boys sing and dance and openly make love in elaborate religious celebrations. But the worshippers of Jaweh have not given up; driven underground and onto a polluted island, their faith has grown ugly and fanatic. They have begun kidnapping youngsters and forcefully converting them. This is the story of 12-year-old Alric and his quest, along with a local wizard, to rescue his lover, abducted and forced into the catacombs of the dark faith. Order EFW, $15.50 Growing Old Disgracefully, by Casmir Dukahz (Acolyte Press, 224 pp) Casmir Dukahz confuses wordplay and foreplay, using both to produce an explosive climax. These accounts of encounters with a bevy of teenage charmers are jammed with puns and double entendre, filled with situations from French farce and slapstick comedy. Seldom is erotic writing so humorous. Dukahz taps an unending store of naughty anecdotes in this pseudo-autobiography of a life spent chasing boys. This fourth volume of his continuing story, weaves the continuing tale of Duke and Remy, his flaxen-haired Baltimore favorite, into a tapestry studded with one-night stands. Order DGO, $16.50 It's Okay to Say Yes, by J. Darling (Acolyte Press, 192 pp) Subtitled: "Close Encounters in the Third World: The Adventures and Misadventures of a Well-Traveled Boy-Lover," Darling's book is an account of a dozen years he spent traveling the world. He has visited all those places where a well-publicized boy-love "scene" exists, and many more where it doesn't. Darling is revealed in these pages as a basically decent man willing to suffer persecution, and even imprisonment, to experience the fulfillment of his desire for physical love. Read with some insight, his book also reveals, perhaps unintentionally, the prejudice and paternalism Westerners often bring to their relationships with boys from far-off lands. Order DIO, $15.50 Kim, My Beloved, by Jens Eisenhardt (Acolyte Press, 192 pp) Jens Eisenhardt describes an incredibly intense love in this auto-biographical novel about a 28-year-old teacher and a pupil half his age. Critics hailed it as a "very important work of erotic literature" when in first appeared in Danish. This English translation lets American readers enjoy Eisenhardt's precise mapping of the emotional journey hazarded by a lonely man who follows his heart to a region proscribed by polite society. Eisenhardt faithfully recounts both the joys and pitfalls of a relationship whose passion must be hidden from the prying eyes of outsiders. Order EMB, $15.50 Lucky Lips, by Rob Elan (Acolyte Press, 224 pp) Ernie Willet is 11 years old, handsome, popular and athletic. He still struggles, though, with the grief of losing his father two years before. He looks for emotional support from 16-year-old Rick, who lives down the street, but it takes classmate Gordie Lewis to show Ernie what it is he really wants from Rick. Rob Elan's account of a boy's discovery of the world outside his home is warm, funny and more than anything else, sexy. Older ELL, $15.50 A Natural Lizard Activity, by B.J. Freedman (Acolyte Press, 176 pp) This boy-love novel is set in California of the 70s amid the obsessive fans of the Grateful Dead who style themselves Dead-heads. Thirteen-year-old Kim and his Pop are packed off on a transcontinental bus by Mom and her new dope-dealing lover. Once a trendy professor, Pop had burned out his wits on an overdose of sacred mushrooms; by the time he and Kim end up in Venice Beach, the child has definitely become father to the man. When a 31-year-old coke dealer falls for Kim, it sets the stage for a comic, erotic trek through the state of California as the teenager seeks to balance his responsibilities to his family, his lover and himself. Freedman's casual racism is a bummer, almost scuttling the novel's appeal. But his eye for the realistic detail - emotional, geographic and sociological - makes the novel worth the trip. Order FNL, $15.50 Operation Jock, by C.R. Labarge (Acolyte Press, 180 pp) Operation Jock is very much like the problem novels aimed at juvenile readers you might remember from the Scholastic books you used to order through your English class in junior high school. Of course, I can't recall a scholastic book where the protagonist's problem was anything like this: how can 14-year-old Evan, just beginning to understand the joys of boy-boy sex, integrate his sensitive lover into the gang of rowdy jocks that are Evan's best friends. But Evan's other concerns would fit right into one of Scholastic's extracurricular readers: how to convince his mother to let him try out for junior varsity football, and what to do about an anti-tax activist who wants to cancel the school sports program to save money. Order LOJ, $15.50 The Paggers Papers, by Richard Rawson (Acolyte Press, 192 pp) For years a little Philippine village had been famous for taking tourists on boat trips to a scenic waterfall. Western gays soon discovered that many of the handsome, muscular boatmen were willing to supplement their meager earnings with prostitution. Soon, their younger brothers were drawn into the game, and vacationing boy-lovers arrived in increasing numbers. In the mid-seventies, Western media labeled the situation an example of child abuse and exploitation, and local politicians built careers promising to crack down. This book is one man's recollection of the village when man/boy relationships were tolerated, and even encouraged. It's partly a nostalgic paean to a boy-lover's lost paradise, partly a social document about boys' sexuality as it can develop in a palliative environment. Rawson's memoir shows that the accounts of abuse were products of narrow prejudice, but his portrait of himself as a not-particularly-sensitive Westerner proves that sex-tourism has complexities that deserve a more nuanced analysis. Order RPP, $15.50 Panthology 4 (Coltsfoot Press, 192 pp) This short-story collection provided the model for the Acolyte Reader series published by Coltsfoot's successor, and many of the authors will be familiar to fans of those anthologies. Though not without drama and conflict, these are, first of all, happy stories about men and boys and sex. Among the stories: a 13-year-old-boy robot has human feelings; a boy at summer camp falls in love with his counselor; a boy-lover rescues two young beggars in Calcutta; two very different stories about religious boys, and much more. Order PAN4, $22.00 Shakespeare's Boy, by Casmir Dukahz (Acolyte Press, 248 pp) The final book and the only novel written by Dukahz before his death in 1988 is removed by centuries from his whimsical accounts of 20th Century America. He uses the Elizabethan Age and the world of Shakespeare's Globe Theater as the backdrop for the story of Ruy, orphan and actor. The 13-year-old thespian achieves instant and tumultuous fame in the role of Juliet, but his romances off-stage are as passionate as anything the Immortal Bard ever envisioned. Seduced by tramps and kings, Ruy's gender-bending on stage lends spice to homoerotic encounters that begin once the curtain falls. Order DSB, $15.50 Singularities: Book I, by Robert Campbell (Acolyte Press, 192 pp) The stories in "Singularities" focus on man/boy relationships in a variety of settings, punctuated with a series of parodies of newspaper advice columns that would make Ann Landers blush - at the very least. Campbell's vision spans a Caribbean island, a military prep school, a junior varsity football team and a lonely outpost in the African desert. Though much of the value of "Singularities" comes from the variety of plot and settings, recurring themes provide an underlying unity to Campbell's writing. One is the persistence, ingenuity and resilience of pederast relationships that thrive even in the most hostile environment; another is the contrast between the expansive joy of those relationships and the crabbed morality of religious bigots who condemn them. Order CS1, $15.50 Something Like Happiness, by Kevin Esser (Acolyte Press, 202 pp) Andy Damon swipes a picture of Caravaggio's Victorious Amor from his small-town Midwestern library and launches himself on a libidinous adventure that introduces him to a world of pot smoking, kiddie porn and anything-goes sex parties. Along the way he meets a host of boys not so different from himself: the black Spinks twins, Snickers and Deacon, Manny and Fernando Fuentes, track star Timmy Jenco, and Matthew, the neighborhood paper boy. Some are "gay" and some are "straight," but they're all grist for sexy Andy's mill. Esser captures the excitement of the young male animal with exceptionally vivid prose and reveals a touching sensitivity when Andy's sex-hunt becomes a search for true love. Order ESL, $15.50 Strange Catharsis, by Daniel Mallery (Acolyte Press, 240 pp) When Richard Eldred takes a job as house parent at a boarding school for problem children located in the wild Scottish highlands, he hopes the isolation will restore the inspiration that's has seeped away after a series of best-selling novels and film scripts. But he finds a growing attraction to the boys at the school that suggests a deeply buried motivation. There's Danny, a tough boy exploding through puberty, who battles authority with his fists. And Hansa, a gentler, reserved boy desperately seeking love. And Steve, whose perfectly developed runner's body hides a heart sickness. As Eldred helps them solve their problems, he finds a solution to his own alienation - but one that challenges him to respond to feelings he's long suppressed. Mallery's compelling novel has needlessly Gothic plot complications, but is both warm and sexy. Order MSC, $17.50 Twofer 1 (Acolyte Press, 256 pp) Acolyte Press planned to launch this series to reprint boy-love novels at a discount price; the volume contains two full-length works of fiction. Since the company is now closed, this "Twofer 1" will be the only one. It contains "Starcross," which traces the love life of Richie McAlister. He makes love for the first time on his fifteenth birthday; his partner is straight, but Richie soon finds he's not, and pursues the love of younger boys across the country and onto the balmy waters of the Bahamas. "Solos Duets and Improvisations" chronicles the sexual couplings and uncouplings at a woodsy music school for young prodigies where everyone, it seems, plays skin flute. Order ATS, $17.50 **BIOGRAPHY** The Basketball Diaries, by Jim Carroll (Penguin, 210 pp) The book that was the basis for the hit movie has more wit, more truth and more sex than the screen version (though it doesn't have Leonardo DiCaprio). Apparently Carroll wrote too casually about peddling his meat to homebound businessmen in the toilets of Grand Central Station for Hollywood to deal with. So 20 years after the publication of his memoirs, the silver screen gets a sanitized version for public consumption. If you want the real stuff, here it is. Order CBD, $12.50 Boys Like Us, edited by Patrick Merla (Avon Book, hardcover, 365 pp) Subtitled "Gay Writers Tell Their Coming Out Stories," this collection of autobiographical pieces is a vivid window into the sexual awakening of boys. The accounts include Samuel Delaney's realization (at age 11) that his lust for other boys at summer camp made him somehow different, Michael Nava's single night of sex with his l6-year-old high school debating partner and Matthew Stadler's fruitless attempts to seduce his friends in eighth grade. Other writers, like Michael Carroll, Douglas Sadownick and Rodney Christopher describe happy and successful experiences with other boys (at age 12, 15 and 18 respectively). Edmund White remembers a trip to Mexico at 14 where he had sex for the first time, with a grown man who played piano in the hotel bar. Order MBL, $25.50 Calamus Lovers, edited by Charley Shively (Gay Sunshine Press, 220 pp) "Calamus Lovers" examines the poet's relations with common men of the 19th century. Edward Carpenter, an English lover, wrote: "The unconscious, uncultured, natural types pleased him best." Many letters from some of these "natural types," often unpublished until now, place Walt Whitman's Calamus poems in context and provide a unique insight into gay life in those years. Charley Shively identifies correspondence as Whitman's lovers and pinpoints for the first time Fred Vaughan as the inspiration for the poems. Besides introductions and commentaries on the letters, Shively presents a selection of Whitman's gayest poems. Order SCL, $11.50 Drum Beats, edited by Charley Shively (Gay Sunshine Press, 256 pp) "Drum Beats" offers exciting letters to poet Walt Whitman from fifty soldiers and lovers, including the drummer boys and other youth who made up the mostly-teenage Union army during the Civil War. Charley Shively's introduction contains a startling new vision of the war and of Whitman's poetry. Published from original manuscripts, the letters provide eloquent testimony of the common soldier's love for Whitman ("Wound Dresser and Good Kisser"). Shively has also found remarkable new material on Abraham Lincoln's gay love life and on the homosexual underworld of John Wilkes Booth. Order SDB, $12.50 Growing Up Gay in the South, by James T. Sears (Harrington Park Press, 560 pp) Thirteen biographies provide the starting point for examination of the unique pressures faced by gay children in the South, including family name and family honor, the pervasiveness of religious fundamentalism and the intensity of adolescent culture. Jonathon Kozol called it "a wonderful portrayal of the way all kids grow up - the cliques that form, the sense of pecking order, the fear of being spurned... ." Sears also highlights the courage of young people who find themselves sexual rebels and make the most of their rebellion. Order SGU, $21.50 Memories That Smell Like Gasoline, by David Wojnarowicz (Artspace Books, 61 pp) David Wojnarowicz was one of the most provocative artists of his generation. In prose and pictures, he explores memory, the longing for love and sexuality in the specter of AIDS in "Memories That Smell Like Gasoline." His extraordinary life, beginning with his days as a "kid prostitute in New York" before his tenth birthday, is recalled in ten cartoon/comic narratives, in paintings of Third Avenue porno movie houses (before Health Department closures in 1988), ten diary entries and a series of dream-like memoirs. These episodes from artists life create a sometimes devastating, always sublime document about coming of age in America. Order WMT, $16.50 Michael Jackson Was My Lover, by Victor Gutierrez (No publisher, 216 pp) Author Victor Gutierrez passes himself off as an investigative journalist, but what he really knows is how to dish the dirt. "Michael Jackson Was My Lover" is gossip at its spiciest. Everything you always wanted to know about Michael but were afraid to ask (or couldn't find anyone to answer). The book includes the cheesiest photos imaginable, including the boy's underwear and "the actual bathroom ... where some of the sexual relations occurred." To write this kind of book. you must have no shame. Gutierrez splendidly fills the bill. Order GMJ, $11.50 The Orton Diaries, edited by John Lahr (Da Capo Press, 304 pp) Popular playwright Joe Orton was beaten to death with a hammer by his lover, Kenneth Halliwell, in 1967. Halliwell then committed suicide, leaving a note that claimed Orton's diaries would explain everything. The playwright's account of the last eight months of his life, published in this volume, certainly don't leave anything out. They include a record of the two months Orton and Halliwell spent in Tangiers, where both indulged in uninhibited encounters with Moroccan teenagers. Edited by Orton biographer John Lahr, the diaries reveal both the sharp wit and the fascination with sleazy sex that mark Orton's work for the stage. Order LOD, $16.50 **FICTION** Ambidextrous, by Felice Picano (Hard Candy Books, 336 pp) Critics howled that Picano's novel about "The Secret Lives of Children" was unbelievable, because real boys, 11 to 13 years old, never had sexual adventures like those detailed here. And Picano pointed out that his book was a "memoir in the form of a novel" and the adventures in Ambidextrous were his own. The irony is that Picano's suburbs in the Fifties weren't remarkable only for sexual opportunities, both hetero and homosexual, it offered to kids in middleclass neighborhoods. His deeper revelation is that adults imposed a version of their children's lives that had nothing to do with the reality the youngsters lived. Critics thirty years later are still loath to admit the truth. But Picano's account of the erotic adventures of his playmates is an attempt to recognize children as fully human, with needs and interests that they pursue regardless of adult objections. Order PAM, $8.50 Barely Legal, edited by John Patrick (STARbooks, 507 pp) What's legal in one place and time, Patrick points out in his introduction, is often forbidden in another, and some of the boys in the stories collected here would be off-base in more conservative jurisdictions. Generally, though, the stories are of older teens. And while the boys are always young, they are rarely innocent. Hustlers and porn stars turn up in a surprising number of tales, though with more than 500 pages of stories, guys who prefer the shy, boy-next-door-type will find some pieces to please as well. Order PBL, $16.50 The Berlin Stories, by Christopher Isherwood (New Directions, 207 pp) Christopher Isherwood's stories of Berlin, published as "I Am a Camera," formed the basis for the hit musical "Cabaret." "The Berlin Stories" collects more tales of his experience in Berlin just before World War II, revisiting some of the same characters. These pieces also draw on the author's experiences as a lover of boys in pre-war Berlin. Isherwood wryly recalls rooming with the working-class family of one of his adolescent lovers, and "On Reugen Island" is one of the most astute portraits of a particular type of man/boy relationship in fiction. Order IBS, $11.50 Bom-Crioulo, by Adolfo Caminha (Gay Sunshine Press, 141 pp) One hundred years ago, an impoverished Brazilian writer published this tale of a 15-year-old cabin boy and the brawny black sailor driven to possess him sexually. Caminha himself had been a teenage midshipman on a Brazilian navy ship; his novel, writes translator E.A. Lacey, "remains a truly revolutionary work: revolutionary in its denunciation of slavery, sadism, cruelty and man's exploitation of man, revolutionary in its revelation of society's complicity, its conspiracy of silence regarding all these abuses; revolutionary in its startling attitudes toward homosexuality, towards race towards interracial and interage contacts ... . Its message echoes beyond our time." Order CBC $9.50 A Boy's Own Story, by Edmund White (Plume, 218 pp) An intelligent, alienated youngster comes to grips with his sexuality in a novel by an acknowledged master of modern prose. "A Boys Own Story" is set in the years that lead from childhood to maturity, full of romantic notions and disillusionments. A bittersweet novel of adolescent sexuality, it evokes memories of the perplexing rites of passage, the comic sexual experiments, the first broken heart and the thrill of forbidden longing. It also records the subtle dynamics of modern family life. Order WBO, $11.50 The Boys on the Rock, by John Fox (St. Martin's Press, 146 pp) Set in the Bronx in the 60s, John Fox's novel details the emotional life of a high-school swimmer who becomes involved in Eugene McCarthy's idealistic campaign for president and discovers a passion for more than politics. His affair with a college student from the campaign has all the magic of first love but also the threat of a broken heart. When his older lover realizes that a gay lifestyle threatens his plans for a life in politics, both struggle to make a difficult choice between the demands of the heart and the realities of homophobia. Order FBR, $10.50 Brutal, by Aiden Shaw (Millivres Books, 131 pp) Set in London's underground club scene, "Brutal" draws on author Aiden Shaw's own experiences as a prostitute. Paul, the fictional protagonist finds himself, at a young age, drug-addicted, spinning out of control on alcohol, HIV positive and haunted by the sickness and death of friends and lovers. An often bleak and unaffected portrait of a particularly modern dead-end, "Brutal" offers insight but little solace. It is sobering indeed to read a young man's book about death. Order SBR, $14.50 Closer, by Dennis Cooper (Grove Press, 131 pp) The characters of "Closer," California-perfect denizens of the LA-area punk scene of the 80s, recoil from emotion and commitment as though they were allergic to caring or compassion, but desire persists. Driven, with increasing desperation, to find in sex something more than the collisions of flesh and blood, they play with drugs and violence. A bleak and sometimes horrifying vision, "Closer" offers no pat solutions to their alienation but somehow suggests an ineffable presence on the edge of the void. Order CCL, $10.50 Cry to Heaven, by Ann Rice (Ballantine Books, 566 pp) The author of the famous "Vampire Chronicles" brings to life the exquisite society of the 18th century castrati, the delicate and alluring male sopranos who were put under the surgeon's knife to prolong mastery of the vocal range attained by boy singers. Guido Maffeo was castrated when he was six years old and sent to study with the finest singing masters in Naples. Tonio Treschi was kidnapped as he approached adolescence, castrated in a scheme to keep him from claiming his place in one of the most powerful aristocratic families in Venice. Rice follows their development as musicians and as lovers, in many ways boys forever, filled with passions that challenge the limits of their bodies as their voices challenge the creative efforts of the world's great composers. Among the many things Rice does well is portray the sexuality of children, and she does it to great effect in "Cry to Heaven." Order RCH, $8.50 Dark Rides, by Derek McCormack (Quarter Press, 99 pp) "Dark Rides" is a novel told in stories, life in a small town circa 1952 described by a gay teenager named Derek McCormack. To examining physician Dr. Vine, Derek's an invert, his sexual desires taboo. But official sanction can't keep Derek from sniffing out tales of Caligula's decadence at the Peterborough Public Library or feeling up his boyfriend Hugh in the livestock pens behind the county fair. Illustrated with period photographs of midways, tractor shows and rodeos, McCormack's stories dazzle. Order MDR, $11.50 Disorder and Chaos, by Simon Lovat (Millivres Books, 249 pp) When Keith, a civil servant in his late thirties, encounters Nick, teenaged, beautiful, down-and-out, utterly dishonest and amoral, it sets in motion of sequence of events that move inexorably towards tragedy. Lovat's novel documents the way innocent sexual choices expose men to anxiety and abuse while genuine problems brew in a silence that explodes in violence and death. "Disorder and Chaos" exposes the hypocrisy of British life by locating this narrative of a man/boy relationship in a backdrop of sweeping sociological observation. Order LDC, $13.50 The Dream Life, by Bo Huston (St. Martins, 165 pp) When does the rescue of an unhappy adolescent from a loveless upper-class existence turn into a kidnapping? Perhaps when the boy's tutor becomes his pimp and 13-year-old Jed starts turning tricks to finance his flight with the fascinating Hollis Flood. By the time the pair reaches California, the situation is spinning out of control, but Huston's writing remains precise and sure. Order HDL, $10.50 Dream Boy, by Jim Grinsley (Scribner, 195 pp) Jim Grimsley's realistic story of small-town farm boys struggling toward love is shadowed by another tale, by turns luminous and dark. Fifteen-year-old Nathan is drawn to a neighbor two years older. Stolen kisses in a school bus and a cemetery lead the boys into the dream world of the title, but the raw realism of small-town America is never far away. But In this complex novel, the dream world of sexual ecstasy has its own dangers. Likewise, the rural world has pleasures to offer, as well as pains endured. In he climax, the line between the worlds is erased in a storm of violence and compassion. Order GDB, $12.50 Entries from a Hot Pink Notebook, by Todd Brown (Washington Square Press, 306 pp) While coming-of-age stories have provided many of the classics of gay literature, Todd Brown's novel of a Reagan-era teen breaks new ground. Ben, his hero, sits watching TV with his Christian fundamentalist grandma as Oprah tries to convince America that gay is good. Brown tells the story of Ben's first love and difficult exit from the closet in a narrative that reveals a particularly post-modern gay teen's life with insight sensitivity and humor. Ben's dysfunctional family and small-town community could easily have been rendered as stereotype, but Brown weaves enough surprises into his tale so that his hero's experiences are representative, but never sink to the level of cliche. Order BEF, $11.50 Fenny Skaller, by John Henry Mackay (Southernwood Press, 166 pp) John Henry Mackay's poetry had already won him the description of an "anarchist lyricist" when he began writing "The Books of the Nameless Love" in 1905. "Fenny Skaller" is one of those books, a novel in which the Scotch-German philosopher traces the lives and loves of a man in his forties as he reminisces over a collection of photographs of boys he has known. His night-time reflections reveal pathos and heartbreak, but also a growing self-awareness and acceptance of himself as a boy-lover. With the dawn, "Fenny Skaller" finds hope and happiness. This volume also includes short prose pieces from "The Books of the Nameless Love." Order MFS, $12.50 For a Lost Soldier, by Rudi von Dantzig (Gay Men's Press) During the winter of 1944 in occupied Holland, eleven-year-old Jeroen is evacuated to a small fishing community on the desolate coast of Friesland, where he meets Walt, a young Canadian soldier with the Allied forces. Their relationship immerses the young boy in a tumultuous world of emotional and sexual experience, suddenly curtailed when the Allies move on and Walt disappears. Back home in Amsterdam, a city in the throes of liberation fever, Jeroen searches for the soldier he has lost. A child's fears and confused emotions have rarely been described with such depth of understanding, and seen as it is from the child's viewpoint, it invites total empathy. Order DFL, $16.50 The God in Flight, by Laura Argiri (Penguin Books, 478 pp) Precocious Simion Satterwhite is just 16 when he arrives at Yale University in 1878, fleeing an abusive fundamentalist father. He meets 31-year-old art professor Doriskos Klionarios and embarks on an emotionally reckless courtship. "The God in Flight" is rich in both plot and character. Argiri's style recalls the great Victorian novels and the works of Charles Dickens, creating a world where love is pure and passion triumphs (after 478 compelling pages!) over pain. And she uses the freedom of modern fiction to tell a story of lover and beloved that would have scandalized another century. Order AGF, $14.50 In Youth Is Pleasure, by Denton Welch (Exact Change, 254 pp) William Burroughs names Denton Welch as the writer who "has most directly influenced my own work." It's a measure of Welch's power that an author whose style is, on the surface, so completely different, names him as a mentor. But what is shared by the Burroughs brutal novels of sex, drugs and death and Welch's narrative of life in the British countryside is the boy-hero who sees a different world beneath the reality shared by others. And the key to that world is in the homoerotic gaze of the youth in question. The volume also contains a fragment from Welch's journal left unfinished at his death at the age of 33. Order WYP, $15.50 The Liar, by Stephen Fry (Soho Press, 277 pp) A comic novel about a likable British student who simply can't tell the truth, "The Liar" is both a series of hilarious setpieces and a tightly plotted parody of espionage thrillers with more genuine surprises than many authentic spy stories. From boarding school tart to duplicitous coach of a boy's cricket team to college campus forger (passing of a play about pedophile incest as an undiscovered manuscript by Charles Dickens!), Adrian's just getting started. Critics cite Oscar Wilde, Evelyn Waugh and even Monty Python as Fry's predecessors, and this first novel demonstrates he's worthy of such praise. Order FTL, $12.50 Loving Sander, by Joseph Geraci (Gay Men's Press, 160 pp) An American photography scholar working in Holland has befriended the ten-year-old son of colleagues there. Over the next two years, Will is caught increasingly in tensions between Sander's mother Marijke and her estranged husband Niek over his growing intimacy with Sander. And the boy himself - lovable but difficult - is ever more demanding. As Sander's twelfth birthday approaches, Will has to decide whether to return to San Francisco or stay and face the risks of his friendship and Sander's need for him. Order GLS, $14.50 Mad About the Boys, edited by John Patrick (STARbooks, 544 pp) The theme in this collection of erotic fiction is supposed to be boys who get excited by sex in public, but the hottest tale in the book is one where little brother Jamie has to sneak up on big brother Vic so he can get a look at the older's boy's cock. "Eddie's Audition," which turns Menudo into Los Muchachos and spins a fantasy about the sexlife of the Hispanic boys singers. In "The Rendezvous," voyeurism grows into a "menage-a-trois." Included along with the short stories are two full-length novels. Order PMA, $16.50 The Man Without a Face, by Isabelle Holland (Harper Keypoint, 157 pp) Originally published in 1972, the novel that was the basis for the hit movie differs from the screen version in several interesting ways. Instead of exposing a town's intolerance about a relationship it can't understand, Holland focuses on the boy's own conflicts. And where the film suppressed the physical element of this love between a teacher and pupil, it's a key facet in the novel. What's also interesting is that this novel, so radical in many ways, has a deep conservative strain. Order HMW, $5.50 Mike and Me, by Anonymous (Badboy, 147 pp) Mike joined his junior-college gymnastics squad to bulk up on muscle. But between his buffed teammates and his sexy younger cousin, he ends up burning more calories in the bedroom than on the gym floor The locker room becomes his cruising ground, and since cousin Kevin's a star wrestler, every young jock in town gets a spot on Mike's sexual wish list. By the time the team heads for the regional finals, the cream of Minnesota's athletic community is lining up for a minute with Mike. Non-stop sex action and not much else, "Mike and Me" will keep you turning the pages - with one hand, at least. Order AMM, $7.50 My Worst Date, by David Leddick (St. Martin's Press, 259 pp, hardcover) Hugo looks like a typical Miami teenager; the 16-year-old hangs out at the beach, works a part-time job to save money for college and dates someone his single mother wouldn't approve of. But Hugo is anything but typical. His job isn't at the local pizza place, like he told his mother, but at a gay bar, where he dances as a go-go boy. And the person he's seeing on the sly is a much older man - who's also dating Hugo's mother. David Leddick's comic first novel uses the glamorous ambiance of South Beach Miami to good advantage and offers a cast of amusing characters. According to Quentin Crisp, "the descriptions of sex make D.H. Lawrence seem like Barbara Cartland, but it's about more than sex." Order LMW, $24.50 The Mysterious Skin, by Scott Heim (Harper Collins, 292 pp) When a Little Leaguer wakes up with a bloody nose in the crawl space of his small-town Kansas house with no memory of how he got there or what happened to him in the past several hours, it triggers an obsession that focuses on abduction by a UFO. But his search for an answer leads him to a former Little League teammate, now a teenage hustler with a definite penchant for older men he traces back to the coach of that team. Heim's vivid prose is as open as the grain fields of the Kansas farm belt where his story takes place. If this were the Kansas Dorothy knew, nothing in Oz would have surprised her. Heim's first novel is an impressive literary debut and an absorbing tale, by turns sexy, funny and troubling. We have a very few autographed copies available, so order right away. Order HMS, $14.00 Out of Bounds, by Mike Seabrook (Gay Men's Press, 297 pp) This British love story may contain more about cricket than any American cares to know, but it's their shared passion for the game that brings schoolmaster Graham Curtis and his 17-year-old Stephen Hill together as lovers. Against the background of team sports, their affair seems one of many possibilities for affectionate male relationships. And the kindness of coaches and teammates becomes crucial when a blackmailer threatens. Order SOB $16.50 Persecuted Minority, by Frits Bernard (Southernwood Press, 98 pp) A fifteen-year-old school boy falls in love with his teacher. His father discovers a love letter. The teacher and the boy spend a day by the sea, and the consequences are disastrous. "Persecuted Minority" asks if a love condemned and outlawed can survive. In the Netherlands, at least, the book helped to overturn the laws criminalizing homosexual relationships for boys between 16 and 21 years old. The Southernwood Press edition of this historic novel is beautifully designed and printed. Order BPM, $11.50 The Persian Boy, by Mary Renault (Vintage Books, 419 pp) History tells us much about the conquests of Alexander the Great, whose military campaigns brought virtually all the world he knew under his domination. And history even hints of his relationship with Bagoas, a Persian slave who became the emperor's lover. But it takes a work of imagination to breath life and passion into this age-old tale. Mary Renault has provided that imagination in a moving and convincing novel that follows Bagoas from the home of his honored father to a life of degradation and whoredom and finally to the bed of the most powerful man of the ancient era. Order RPB, $14.50 Ragged Dick, by Horatio Alger (Signet Classic, 186 pp) The first successful book by the writer who became the most renowned author of boy's fiction in history. As the introduction to this new edition notes, Alger's books relied on a formula: poor but honest boy makes good, thanks to hard work and the help of a older male friend. But that formula meant something real to Alger (who was dismissed from the ministry over charges of "unnatural" relationships with boys - charges he never denied). Today Alger is remembered as the apostle of unfettered capitalist competition. Rereading his books, one is struck that, more than the world of commerce where his boys labored to succeed, Alger champions the warm bond between a generous man and an attractive boy that provided both of them with a respite from the cut-throat world of the market and the street. Order ARD, $6.50 Rent Boy, by Gary Indiana (High Risk Books, 121 pp) Rent boy is British slang for a hustler, but the sex professional in Gary Indiana's novel is an all-American student who may be too smart for his own good. That doesn't keep him from getting involved in a mad doctor's scheme to kidnap unwilling organ donors. But Danny's good sense does start alarm bells ringing in his brain just when it may be too late to back out of the weird surgeon's plans for a big payoff. Indiana's novel uses the demi-monde of Manhattan hustling to comic and macabre effect and proves the hooker with a heart of gold is a theme ripe for re-picking in the nineties. And the sleek design by High Risk makes "Rent Boy" a book that's physically fun to read - an apt metaphor for it's pay-for-play narrative. Order IRB, $12.50 Rolling the R's, by R. Zambora Linmark (Kaya Production, 149 pp, hardcover) Still two years shy of puberty, the hero of R. Zamora Linmark's first novel is ready and eager to come of age. Edgar's too busy to do his fifth grade homework because he's building a queer identity for himself, taking "No-Doz, Folger's and Coca Cola" to fuel endless hours of watching skin flicks and "Charlie's Angels." Lip synching to Donna Summer along with his own gang of bad girls, he dreams of kissing Scott Baio from "Happy Days" while getting real-life sex education from the grade-school janitor while the other kids play football at recess. "Rolling the R's" rushes like a roller coaster, mixing all-American pop culture with the unique polyglot heritage of the Hawaiian Islands. But anchoring this wild ride is a poignant feeling for what it's like to be a boy who knows he's queer - and knows what he's up against - years before anyone else is ready to acknowledge his feelings. Order LRT, $23.00 Runaways/Kid Stuff, by John Patrick, editor (STARbooks, 635 pp) The respective titles pretty much define the specific themes of this two-books-in-one collection of a seeming endless supply of teen sex. "Runaways" mixes fiction with true-life accounts of homeless boys whose experience range from romantic encounters with older dream-lovers to humiliating bouts of S&M action as boy sex-slaves. "Kid Stuff" contains more carefree pleasures, adolescence recalled in stories like "Game Night, My First Lesson" and "Matty Makes the Team." Order PRA, $16.50 Secret Passions, edited by John Patrick (STARbooks, 528 pp) This collection of erotica from John Patrick has all the sizzling sex fans of his porn anthologies expect. But his theme in this one is boys just discovering (or desperately trying to hide) their hunger for other boys. That leads to stories that explore the thrill of seduction, the joys of discovery and the reality that the pleasures delayed just a little while taste sweeter when they come. Many publishers of modern erotica are unwilling to print stories about boys. Not STARbooks; young teens, high school hunks, and innocent-but-eager-young virgins, pop up in lots of the pieces in this 500-page collection. Order PSP, $16.50 The Sex Offender, by Matthew Stadler (Harper Collins, 206 pp) In this scary tale from the not-to-distant future, a teacher who has sex with one of his students is sent for mental-reconditioning and given a new identity. As Mr. Uh-uh, the offender uncovers a secret world that mocks the puritanism of his society and finds that true passion draws him inevitably away from the "normalcy" of a world where love can be a crime. Both a darkly comic story and a sophisticated analysis of identity and sexuality, Stadler's ambitious novel is an important and enduring work. Order SSO, $13.50 The Singalong Tribe, by Kent Ashford (Gay Men's Press, 182 pp) The callboys of the Singalong Pension work with one aim in view: to escape the poverty and hardship of Manila. Amid that squalor that tourists consider exotic, the boys have only their bodies and their cunning to keep themselves alive. Vividly set in the Philippines, this is a story of money, sex and the quest for social justice. Kent Ashford spent many years as a journalist in Southeast Asia, and he uses his first-hand knowledge of the region to provide realism to his tale. "The Singalong Tribe" also shows genuine concern for the people of the Philippines and provides a fascinating vision of their culture. Order AST $9.00 Superfag, by Daniel Curzon (Igna Press, 218 pp) Daniel Curzon's satirical novel opens with God sending his son to earth on a mission to rid the world of homophobia. Dubbed Superfag instead of Jesus Christ, this younger Son of God nearly faces of crucifixion of his own when he's caught giving a pubescent boy a blow job in a tree house. He escapes, barely, and is launched on a series of adventures that hilariously highlight bigotry and hypocrisy in politics, religion, the media and "just plain folks." Curzon, one of the pioneers of gay fiction, takes on an entire herd of sacred cows in a funny novel that honors the original radical spirit of gay liberation. Order CSF, $11.50 The Swimming Pool Library, by Alan Hollinghurst (Vintage International, 336 pp) This stunning literary debut was a sensation and a bestseller in both England and America, enthralling and darkly erotic. William Beckwith, a young gay aristocrat leads a life of pleasure and promiscuity. His pursuit of pleasure began with boyhood adventures with schoolmates and continues with his cruising London, an eye open for the young and willing working-class partners he prefers. When he meets elderly Lord Nantwich, an old African hand seeking a biographer, Beckwith learns of another era of boy-loving when the consequences were often disastrous. Bristling with wit and spunk, Hollinghurst's novel is absorbing and delightful. Order HSP, $13.50 Talking to Strange Men, by Ruth Rendell (Pantheon Books, 280 pp, hardcover) Ruth Rendell is the best mystery writer working today. In "Talking to Strange Men," she weaves with a sure hand the lives of an enthusiastic schoolboy, an embittered shop clerk and boy-lover trying desperately to avoid temptation and further problems with the law. When the clerk stumbles across a coded message, he thinks he's discovered an actual espionage ring, rather than an elaborate game of spy-vs-spy between boys at rival British boarding schools. He decides to hook his ex-wife's new lover into the affair. That sets boy and boy-lover on a collision course with terrifying consequences, in a plot with enough surprises to keep it compelling through its conclusion. Along the way, savor Rendell's brisk prose and here eye for telling detail. A special purchase makes it possible for Ariel's Pages to offer this hardcover book at a paperback price. Order RTT, $9.50 That Day at the Quarry, by Tom Shaw (Outbound Press, 156 pp) Michael Bronski writes in his introduction that "That Day at the Quarry" is about what it means to become a man in America. For the narrator of this autobiographical novel, becoming a man means becoming a queer, earning the right to suck cock. It's a privilege not granted without struggle, as his friends are boarding school kids with a shared interest in the tortures inflicted by Native Americans on their captives and the interrogation practices in Nazi prisoner-of-war camps. When the boys begin to express their fascination on the bodies of each other, they create a rite of passage that delivers both knowledge and pleasure both purchased at great price. Not quite a tale of torture, it's certainly one of the most rigorous initiations available. This is sadism not as a fantasy game played by men with store-bought whips and expensive leather but as a very real quest organized by teens with the odds and ends of garage and junk yard. Bob and Jim are winners in a poker game that delivers the narrator into their hands for 24 hours. He discovers in that night and a day the very limit of what his body can endure and finds at that limit the beginnings of an erotic life. Order STD, $10.50 Touched, by Scott Campbell (Bantam Books, 313 pp, hardcover) When 12-year-old Robbie Young comes home from the mall and tells his mother, "Jerry Houseman's been touching me," he's not prepared for the power of his announcement. The revelation does far more than end the year-long relationship between a small town mailman and a boy beginning to feel the restless independence of adolescence. Scott Campbell's novel, narrated in turn by Robbie's mother, by Jerry himself, by Jerry's wife and by Robbie (fifteen years after the fact) chronicles the harrowing results of a collision between love and law. Like each of the characters, readers too will be touched by the cruelty of a system that offers to solace to neither man nor boy and serves only those hungry for revenge. Order CTD, $24.00 Try, by Dennis Cooper (Grove Press, 199 pp) Simultaneously deadpan and queasily raw, "Try" is the story of Ziggy, the adopted teenage son of two sexually abusive fathers whose failed experiment at nuclear-family domesticity has left him stranded with one and increasingly present in the fantasies of the other. He turns from both of these men to his uncle, who sells kiddie-porn videos on the black market, and to his best friend, a junkie whose own vulnerability inspires in Ziggy a fierce and awkward devotion. In "Try", Cooper illuminates with utter clarity the need to possess wholly something that will fill the profound emptiness of the human soul. Order CTR, $12.50 Unnatural Relations, by Mike Seabrook (Gay Men's Press, 279 pp) Fifteen-year-old Jamie Potten has a father who's a brute and a mother who drinks. Nineteen-year-old Chris, Jamie's new friend, brings the boy rare joy and solace. For the boys, making love is a natural expression of their friendship - but to the law, it's very unnatural. In fact, it's "buggery with a minor," and Chris' own youth can't keep him out of the prosecution box when Jamie's father decides to make trouble for the boys. Can two young lovers find in their passion and devotion the strength to fight prejudices which have endured for generations? Mike Seabrook draws on his own experience as a policeman to provide accurate depictions of the process of arrest, interrogation and prosecution. Order SUR, $16.50 User, by Bruce Benderson (Plume/Penguin Books, 227 pp) Bruce Benderson's "User" presents a society just as scary - and it's our own! Benderson's portrayal of a street hustler and dope addict named Apollo is both hilarious and unsparing: it only hurts when you laugh. Apollo's violent encounter with the bouncer in a porno theater puts him at the center of a circle of sharply observed characters: Detective Pargero, who investigates the assault on his Times Square turf with an interest that's a little more than professional, Baby Pop, the 13-year-old son of the victim, a math genius junior-high dropout who's already turning tricks on his own, and one of Apollo's ex-tricks who's dying of AIDS and loneliness. A few autographed copies are on hand for readers who order first. Order BUS $11.50 When Jonathan Died, by Tony Duvert (Gay Men's Press, 174 pp) Like many novels, this book is the story of a love affair. What is less usual is that Jonathan, an artist, is almost thirty when the story starts, while Serge is a boy of eight. Duvert delivers a cool and matter-of-fact portrayal of a sensitive theme, a welcome alternative to the hysteria surrounding the age taboo in the English-speaking countries. Like all lovers, Jonathan and Serge create their own microcosm of domestic and erotic ritual, but theirs is a world that shatters on contact with the surrounding society. Duvert's novel is extraordinary because he makes the psychology of his characters more compelling rather than sensational, forcing readers to accept their relationship on its own terms. Nor does the author flinch from a heartrending conclusion that even Jonathan, deeply in love, sees all along is inevitable. Order DWJ $14.50 Young Tom, by Forrest Reid (Gay Men's Press, 169 pp) The works of Forrest Reid powerfully conveys the essence of childhood. This first book of his trilogy about the life of English lad Tom Barber is published by Gay Men's Press, although the story contains no overtly gay content. But the gay ambiance is nonetheless palpable. Reid evokes rather than explains, and this classic 1944 novel captures him at the height of his powers Order RYT $9.50 **NON-FICTION** The Age Taboo, edited by Daniel Tsang (Alyson Publications, 178 pp) Tsang centers this collection of essays on man/boy love around the issues of gay may sexuality, power and consent. He has labored to include disparate voices in the discussion, with pieces from feminists Kate Millet and Pat Califia as well as the editors of "Lesbian Rising." Gay and lesbian teenagers, some themselves in cross-generation relationships, are also represented, and the subjects of childhood, ageism, racism and ideology are explored. Order TAB, $9.50 Boys on Their Contacts with Men, by Theo Sandfort (Global Academic Publishers, 176 pp) A book written for the general reader about Sandfort's study of 25 Dutch boys between the ages of 10 and 16 who were currently involved in sexually expressed friendships with men. None of the relationships had been disturbed by intervention by the authorities, and all of the boys viewed their older friends and the sex they shared in a positive manner. An appendix presents complete interviews with three of the boys. Order SBM, $17.50 Children's Sexual Encounters with Adults, by C.K. Li et al (Prometheus Books, 343 pp, hardcover) This detailed report of a study conducted at Cambridge University presents findings that conflict with much popular wisdom. "Sexual encounters between boys and adults are surprisingly common ... with no particular consequences." Li and his co-authors include a statistical analysis of a survey on the sex histories of male students and draw some provocative conclusions from the data. They include extensive excerpts from students' conversations about their sexual encounters during childhood and adolescence. The book contains a skillful demolition of sexologist David Finkelhor's pseudo-scientific position that adult-child sex (and even adult-adolescent) sexual encounters are always unethical. Order LCE, $41.50 Crime Without Victims, by the "Trobrians" Collective (Global Academic Publishers, 150 pp) Danish sexologist Dr. Praben Hertoff provides the introduction for this series of three essays and 16 interviews. The format allows for an impressive variety of opinions on pedophilia. There are interviews with an attorney specializing in the defense of pedophiles, adults involved sexually with children, youngsters who have experienced relationships, and even the mother of one such boy. Most of the youngsters reported that sexual friendships with adults were a positive force in their lives, but the book doesn't ignore the problems posed by man/boy encounters. Order BCV, $16.50 Homosexuality and Male Bonding in Pre-Nazi Germany, edited by Harry Oosterhuis and Hubert Kennedy (Harrington Park Press, 272 pp) Before Hitler's rise to power, Germany was the home to both an impressive youth movement and Europe's most advanced gay rights movement. Quite often, the two overlapped. These radical roots of gay liberation might have been forgotten were they not recorded in "Der Eigene," an early German gay journal. But the writings were ignored for years after Nazism crushed the movement, and many have never before been translated into English. This book rescues those landmark documents, a timely challenge to modern gay activists unwilling to defend youth sexuality. Order OHM, $16.50 Loving Boys, Volume Two by Edward Brongersma (Global Academic Publishers, 512 pp) This is the second (and final) volume of Dr. Brongersma's immense and enormously readable study. Half again as big as the first book, Brongersma covers in great detail the negative aspects of man/boy love (real and imaginary), sexual oppression versus sexual liberation, and finally sex and erotic contacts with boys - what really happens during intimacy between men and boys. This is a supplementary bibliography, a subject index and a register of names and sources for both volumes. Volume One is out of print. Order BLB2, $31.50 Male Intergenerational Intimacy, edited by Theo Sandfort, el al (Harrington Park Press, 325 pp) This is a ground breaking look at new historical, legal, sociological and cross-disciplinary research on sexual intimacy between men of different generations. The book isn't limited to the usual political and psychological arguments about whether such relationships should be permitted or persecuted. Instead, the authors reveal a broad range of interests, including a look at the relationship between a turn-of-the-century artists and the boy who was his favorite model, a study of 2500-year-old Greek inscriptions some claim are the ancient equivalent of men's room graffiti and a sophisticated look at the social construction of childhood sexuality. Order SMI, $21.50 Male Prostitution, by Donald West and Buz de Viliers (Harrington Park Press, 358 pp) This work by leading sex researchers is based on interviews with hundreds of London rent boys. Though the work is a scholarly study conducted under the auspices of Cambridge University, the authors use the plain language of the prostitutes themselves to reveal the details of their lives. The interviews include information on prices, as well as transactions that go sour, unusual, rare and interesting client requests, threats of blackmail and violence (on both sides!) and prostitutes as lovers. Male Prostitution combines rigorous research with a relaxed style and lack of prudish restraint. Order WMP, $19.50 Paedophilia: A Factual Report, by Frits Bernard (Enclave, 101 pp, hardcover) This slim volume reports on scientific research conducted among pedophiles regarding several different questions. Dr. Bernard includes analysis of long-term effects on children in relationships, the age preferences of pedophiles, and their mental health and sociability. Much of the material is presented in charts and graphs, making the results of detailed scientific studies accessible to lay readers. The book, translated from the Dutch, also includes a lengthy bibliography of Bernard's writing. Order BPF, $18.50 Policing Public Sex, edited by Dangerous Bedfellows (South End Press, 416 pp) Activists debate what role the state should play in regulating sexual behavior, especially when issues of public health connect with personal liberty. Particularly trenchant are Wayne Hoffrnan's complaints as a member of a gay generation told to stick to safe sex and keep its mouth shut. He observes that while public tolerance for a gay identity was growing, so was condemnation of sexual behavior, drastically reducing opportunities for teenagers coming of age to fuck and suck. And Stephen Gendin recalls the place of both sex and HIV in the lives of gay men who were teenagers in the early years of the 1980s. Order CPP, $21.50 Regarding Proposed Changes to Article 240B of the Dutch Penal Code, by Lawrence A. Stanley (Lawrence A. Stanley, Esq., 160 pp) They're all here: the celebrated photographer, the unsuspecting parent with family snapshots, the cops banging at the door, the fomenting prosecutor, the overzealous social worker, the FBI, the judges and jury and the children caught in the middle. Read this and shudder. Attorney Lawrence Stanley has written a fascinating and informative analysis of the social misconceptions fueling child pornography hysteria. Citing a number of recent cases of government censorship and police harassment, Stanley untangles the facts from the myths behind the continued assault on contemporary photography and personal liberties. As an attorney who has worked at the heart of the child obscenity issue, Stanley exposes the tortured logic of prosecutors and warns of the tragic consequences of legal policies that purport to protect, but in reality hurt, children. He reports cases of police pressure imposed on "victims" to force confessions of harm where, in fact, there was no harm. It is a tale of lives disrupted, reputations shattered, and artistic freedoms trampled under the heels of runaway moral zeal. Stanley's book includes a bibliography of more than 175 books containing images that might suffer the censor's ax, as well as 25 b&w plates by photographers of serious merit who work includes full frontal nudity of both male and female children. Order SWP, $20.00 The Scapegoat Generation, by Mike A. Males (Common Courage Press, 328 pp) Every night the 10 o'clock news makes it clear that today's teens are a band of violent, sex-crazed louts whose careers of evil are halted only when epidemic drug abuse drives them to miserable deaths by suicide. It's clear as day - but it ain't true! In "The Scapegoat Generation," Mike Males offers well-researched proof that the image of teens fostered by politicians, the media and social conservatives is a pastiche of myth and outright lies. In place of drugs, gangsta rap, TV mayhem and "innate" youth savagery, Males uncovers the increasing poverty of American teens as the major cause of the increasing violence in their lives. Discussing teenage sexuality, the author contorts his own statistics to avoid challenging liberal sacred cows. Too bad he refuses to make the radical conclusions his own research suggests. On the whole, though, "The Scapegoat Generation" does an important job well. Order MSG, $19.50 Taking Liberties, edited by Michael Bronski (Masquerade Books, 469 pp) Michael Bronski accurately points out the wide variety in his collection of recent essays by gay men, so it's interesting how many of them encompass an interest in man/boy relationships. Two essays are explicitly devoted to the topic, and peppers several other contributions. Bruce Bawer's rewrites history to justify his tendentious dismissal of NAMBLA, John Preston opens his memoirs of 30 years of S/M with an account of his teenage relationship with a men in his thirties, and even Lawrence Mass accounts of "Musical Closets" treats the importance not only of Benjamin Britten's homosexuality but his boy-love as well. Jesse Green strains to appear fair while joining the chorus of NAMBLA bashers, but his slips are showing in "The Men from the Boys." Bill Andriette's "Dumbed Down and Played Out" is the jewel in the crown, exceptional both in the level of analysis and the depth of compassion. Order BTL $14.50 Talk Back!, by Lesbian and Gay Media Advocates (Alyson Publications, 120 pp) A training manual for would be activists - and armchair activists - "Talk Back!" will teach you how to fight sloppy reporting and outright lies in the media as well as generate stories that present a more realistic picture of our community. The book's special attention to lesbian and gay concerns makes it a targeted text book for budding activists. With sample letters to use as guides, this book's suggestions for do-it-yourself protest can be put into action immediately. Order LTB $5.50 Two Teenagers in Twenty, edited by Ann Heron (Alyson Publications, 186 pp) This new edition of Heron's original book reprints 24 of the stories from "One Teenager in Ten" and adds 20 more pieces reflecting the lives of gay and lesbian teenagers in the 12 years since the first book was published. Sadly, the young people represented report many of the same problems with homophobia, rejection by family and friends and legal sanctions on their sexuality. But the strength and hope that marked the original volume also persists. Order HTT, $11.50 Varieties of Man/Boy Love, edited by Mark Pascal (Wallace Hamilton Press, 124 pp) Pederasty has been an important part of gay sexuality and a phenomenon that's taken many forms. This collections suggests some of the many different things man/boy relationships have meant to the people in them, and what political and social sense they have made out of them. Personal account flavor Tom Reeves' anecdotal portrait and David Thorstad's "Conversation with a Boy Lover" in 1978. Hubert Kennedy and Steven Adrian Smith contribute historical accounts from Germany and Great Britain. Order NJ8 $9.50 A Witchhunt Foiled: The FBI vs. NAMBLA, by David Thorstad (Wallace Hamilton Press, 91 pp) This history of a hiccup on the part of the police state recounts one of the most heartening David-and-Goliath battles of modern times. On one side was the North American Man/Boy Love Association, a group founded in 1978 to support consensual sexual relationships between boys and men. On the other side was the Federal Bureau of Investigation, using their police power to harass and destroy legitimate political organizations. Near the end of 1982, the Bureau claimed that it had discovered photographs that NAMBLA had been involved in the kidnapping of a boy who had disappeared several years earlier. NAMBLA activists were not only able to prove that the FBI was willing to manufacture evidence and lie to the media to press its absurd case against the group; spokespersons from the organization had the guts to take the spotlight of the national media and turn the tables on the cops. Order NWF, $7.50 Young Gay and Proud, edited by Sasha Alyson (Alyson Publications, 119 pp) A resource book for high school students exploring their sexuality and preparing for coming out, "Young, Gay and Proud" mixes practical advice with chapters calculated to boost self-esteem in the face of homophobia. Included is a chapter of famous gays and lesbians in history. It's interesting, in this book for teenagers, how many of the gay men included on that historic list loved boys, though this isn't acknowledged in the thumbnail biographies of their lives presented in the volume. Order GYG $5.50 **PERIODICALS** GAYME, edited by Bill Andriette "Gayme" brings together the work of outstanding writers of fiction, incisive political and cultural analysts and outstanding photographers to create a periodical that's satisfying on many levels. Early issues have already sold out at prices up to $30 each. The following are still available: Gayme 2.1: Harry Hay offers a new vision for the 90s; Mark Pascal on the politics of cocks, dicks and penises; photography by William Von Gloeden and contemporary studies of the male nude; 20 pages of short fiction; and more. Gayme 2.2: E. Carlotta tours a Mexican bathhouse; Mark Pascal writes on Disgust/Desire; recent photos by Bernard Faucon and Larry Clarke reviewed; fiction by Stephen Dueweke and Rod Downey; Hakim Bey recalls pirate utopias; Mitzel ponders youth and aging; Tom Reeves surveys the state of gay liberation. Gayme 3.1: Kevin Esser's tragedy of plove and plague, Santo Domingo, Guglielmo Pluschow's historic nude studies of adolescents, poems by Antler, D.H. Mader's exploration of the photography and homoerotic images of painter Thomas Eakins, and interviews with cultural agitators Hakim Bey and Camille Paglia. Order G + number, $10.00 Handjobs Magazine (80 pp) Billed as "Daddy Boy Stories," this monthly magazine focuses on sexual experiences between boys and older lovers - not just daddies, but uncles, big brothers, friendly neighbors, coaches, ministers, etc. Name your boy-love fantasy, and you'll likely find it here, along with letters from readers, sexy comic strips and line art, personal ads and more. Our shipments sell out quickly; for the current issue, place your order around the beginning of the month. Back issues are sometimes available as well. Send for a list of available volumes. Order HJ + month, $5.00 Handjobs by Julius (100 pp) Each of these special 100-page issue features a complete graphic novel by the distinctive artist Julius. The Bavarian Chronicles: "The Legacy of Slava," part one of "The Bavarian Chronicles," is presented in this steamy adult comic book. Like the pictures, the story is realistic enough to be genuinely sexy but with an air of the exotic that makes it very definitely a fantasy. Slava's a young refugee in World War II who trades a blow job for a loaf of bread. His deal with a hunky German soldier sets off a sexual daisy chain that eventually includes daddies and their teenage sons, strapping Polish farmhands, the soldiers of four different armies and even Grandpa Otto. Julius devotes each page to a single drawing of his lusty band of war-time lovers, depicting Aryan boys with uncut clicks, older teens just sprouting pubic hair and full grown hirsute hunks with massive cocks, all with beautiful bodies and a potent energy. Order JBC, $21.50 The Bavarian Chronicles II: Volume II continues Julius' sexy tale of smooth-skinned boys and big-dicked daddies frolicking in wartime Germany. Readers might experience guilty pleasures as German schoolboy Klaus flirts with fascism as a species of homoeroticism - but it's Klaus' anti-nazi father, a sturdy socialist blacksmith, who turns out to be the hottest hunk of all. And the political caricatures are a thin veneer to carry an unrestrained fantasy about a world where sex between men and boys is common currency. With 100 full-page drawings to tell the tale, "The Bavarian Chronicles II" offers a dizzying collection of portraits of man/boy couples sucking, fucking, kissing and snuggling. Order JB2, $21.50 Go West: Another erotic adventure by the master of the man/boy comic. In the stylized world of Julius, all boys are smooth-skinned and sleek and men (even Native American) are unfailingly hirsute. Caught "en flagrante delicto" in his step-father's general store, young Jason is sent out west, where he learns how much fun it is to play cowboys and Indians. And, since this is a story by Julius, Jason's very sexy daddy pops up (literally) where he's least expected. Order JGW, $21.50 The Lusty Gods of Bramapur: Another erotic comic by Julius, this tale starts in a boarding school called Masonhurst, where Andrew meets with his teacher for special tutoring sessions. After some hands-on lessons in the sexual customs of exotic lands, Andrew gets to make his own investigations. An incredible journey introduces him to the secret traditions of an ancient culture and to the horny modern men and boys who keep the sexual rites alive. Every page is a picture, with just enough text to thread together these images of guys throbbing, thrusting, hugging and cumming in every imaginable position (and a few positions that defy the imagination!). Order JLG, $21.50 I Am, edited by Chuck Dodson This 'zine by self-proclaimed "pedosmile activist" Chuck Dodson is over-stuffed with a seemingly random assemblage of cartoons, diatribes, collages, ravings, drawings, letters, odd thoughts, naval gazing, cut-outs and all manner of what-not. The chaotic layout style forces you to search to find the gems, and some of the hand-scrawled postings are near-illegible. In the end it's the obsessive, excessive nature of "I Am" that lends it an identity. Order AM + Volume Number (5-9 available), $14.00 each Koinos, published by the Amikejo Foundation (34 pp) A bilingual (German/English) review of pederasty, Koinos covers the history and culture of boy-love, examines response to the phenomenon in various countries and showcases the work of the finest contemporary photographers of adolescents. Each issue features at least 8 full-page photos, some in color. Several issues are already out of print. Koinos 5: Reviews of fiction, travel stories on Vietnam and an Arabic beach resort, a short story on young football players. Koinos 7: Scandal in a church choir, travel to India, boy-lovers and the gay community. Koinos 8: Child pornography and German law, more travel reports from Vietnam, biography of a scout leader, fiction on two schoolboys in love. Koinos 9: the Hite sex report, book and film reviews, naturist travel in France. Koinos 10: child pornography and Dutch law, the 1996 Berlin Film Festival, fiction. Koinos 11: a German youth group fights ageism, youth prostitution in the Third World. Koinos 12: the Dutroux affair in Belgium, changes in views on sexuality, homosexuality in the German Youth movement. Request alternate issues to avoid waiting for issues on back order. Order KO plus number, $11.50 each Made in the USA, edited by Renato Corazza (48 pp) An photo magazine that celebrates youth with a series of photo collages of boys old and young at work and play. Editor/publisher Renato Corazza displays a keen eye and a warm heart. Made in the USA #1: The historic first issue; only a few copies remaining. Made in the USA #2: A new, friendlier format sets it apart from, it's bigger brother, with plenty of room for its collages of beautiful boys. Plus theme pages celebrating the Seven Deadly Sins like you've ever seen them before. And "Soccer Madness" captures the excitement of the world's most popular sport pursued by spirited young athletes. Made in the USA #3: If a picture is really worth 1,000 words, "Made in the USA" is a veritable encyclopedia devoted to the delights of boys. This issue features color covers. A section on pets shows boys with donkeys, rabbits, tigers and a really big pig, in addition to the expected dogs and cats. Photo-collages mix elements in unexpected ways, with proof that verbal vocabulary can manage some pretty sly political commentary. Made in the USA #4: The magazine goes international, with pictures of boys from all around the world. Plus, an illustrated history of family nudism in the United States. Made in the USA #5: From the young punk on the cover to the pensive adolescent on the back, the latest issues features boys of all ages and attitudes. Part two of the illustrated history of nudism, poetry and a stunning boy in a basket round out the collection. Order US + number, $22.00 each Special offer: all five issues for $95.00 The NAMBLA Bulletin For more than 15 years, the voice of the North American Man/Boy Love Association has been this magazine, which grew from a photocopied broad sheet to a sophisticated publication with excellent graphics and variety of text. Any given issue might contain erotic fiction, news reports, political analysis, calls to action, reviews of films and paens to boy actors. Ariel's Pages offers back issues of the NAMBLA Bulletin both for collectors archiving the publications of this historic sexual liberation organization and for neophytes who want to use the magazine to get an idea of what NAMBLA is all about. Older issues are especially rare, so send for a list of back issues in stock before ordering specific numbers at $5.00 each. For a broader view, send $30.00 for ten magazines (our choice of issues). Order BUL plus volume # and issue # ($5.00 each) or VPB for a 10-pack ($30.00) NAMBLA Topics, edited by David Miller Each issue of NAMBLA Topics focuses on a single subject of interest to men who love boys. NAMBLA Topics 1, Anatomy of a Media Attack. An analysis of how a gay paper in Philadelphia treated a story about man/ boy love becomes a study in how the media prints lies and how to fight back Combining media reports, exchanges aired in "Letters to the Editor" columns and reflections by political activists, "Topics One" puts bias under the spotlight. Order TOP 1, $2.00 NAMBLA Topics 2, Criminal Justice? Men imprisoned for sex with boys speak out on their lives behind bars. The pieces here range from reports on daily life in jail to more reflective works the psychology on incarceration, written by prisoners of war in the battle for sexual freedom. Order TOP 2, $3.95 NAMBLA Topics 3, Anarchist of Love. Philosopher John Henry Mackay was an artist as well as a political thinker who created a body of literature exploring his sexual fascination for adolescent boys. Hubert Kennedy's biographical sketch shows how the philosopher's love of boys influenced his political thinking and how he lived out his politics and philosophy in his life with boys. Order TOP 3, $6.50 NAMBLA Topics 4, Boys Speak Out on Man/Boy Love. In letters, short essays and interviews, boys tell their own stories of sexual friendships with men. Many stories focus on the way boys draw from their relationships the power to change their lives. Order TOP 4, $3.95 NAMBLA Topics 5, Poems of Love and Liberation. Classical and modern, famous and obscure, poets have celebrated man/boy love. This collection of their work includes pieces by Shakespeare, W. H. Auden, Paul Goodman and Hakim Bey. Order TOP 5, $3.95 NAMBLA Topics 6, Not Fade Away: Selections from the NAMBLA Bulletin. The first volume in a series of mini-anthologies drawn from the NAMBLA Bulletin, "Not Fade Away" collects pieces from the mid-80s. Even in this small sample, an idea of the impressive range, vitality and insight of the long-running magazine is evident. Illustrated with graphics that echo the variety of the text. Order TOP 6, $3.95 Ophelia Editions Catalog It is not generally the policy of Ariel's Pages to include the works of visual artists, either painters or photographers. Ophelia Editions offers the work of many recognized masters, including Jock Sturges, Sally Mann, and Wilhelm von Gloeden. The company has just expanded its material featuring photography, painting and drawings of boys. Ophelia Editions also sells rare and out-of-print books, and the catalog includes books of literature and "belles lettres," sociology and the politics of censorship, and naturism. Order COE, $3.00 Paidika: The Journal of Paedophilia This scholarly journal of pedophilia has earned mainstream respect with its attention to research and wide-ranging curiosity. "Paidika" devotes serious attention to issues that simply would not be discussed if the magazine did not exist. The editorial board includes an impressive variety of academics, writers, researchers and professionals. Each volume features both historical and cultural material as well as psychological, medical and legal reports of interest. Paidika 5: Interview: Gunter Schmidt; Boy Love in thc Urdu "Ghazal" Tariq Rahman; Man-Boy Sexual Relationships in a Cross-Cultural Perspective by Robert Bausermam; Jerome Duquesnoy the Younger: Two Studies. Paidika 6: Interview: Kenneth Plummer; Boylove, Folksong, and Literature in Central Asia by Ingeborg Baldauf; Erick Pontalley on Celtic Pederasty in Pre-Roman Gaul. Paidika 7: Interview with John Money; Pasteur Joseph Douce: 1945-1990; The CRIES Affaire in Belgium by Casimer Elsen; Street Urchins: Antonio Mancini (1852-1930) by Will H. L. Ogrinc. Paidika 8: Special Women's Issue - Pat Califa on Feminism, Paedophilia, and Children's Rights; A Crush on my Girl-Scout Leader by Nora de Ronde; Sexual Revolution and the Liberation of Children, an Interiew: Kate Millett by Mark Blasius. Paidika 9: Theo Sandfort on children's sexuality; Jan Schuijer on the Dutch age-of-consent laws; Francois Augieras (1925-1971) by Gert Hekma. Paidika 10: Guest editorial, poems and drawing by Graham Ovendon; interview with Gilbert Herdt; The Sexual Experiences of Children, Part II by Theo Sandfort. Paidika 11: Hubert Kennedy on Karol Szymankowski's boy-love novel; Gode Davis on the satanic ritual abuse phenomenon; Marina Knopf on Sexual Contacts Between Women and Children. Paidika 12: Peter Lamborn Wilson on the role of the boy in Sufi ritual; Morris Fraser on boy icons in French art; Jan Schuijer on Legal developments in the Netherlands. Order PA + Volume Number (5-12 available), $16.00 each **POETRY** The Badboy Book of Erotic Poetry, edited by David Laurents (Masquerade Books, 399 pp) This 400-page collection includes at least two dozen poems explicitly about boy-love. Nine fine pieces by Antler open the book, and throughout the volume, pederasty is easily the favorite subject in this comprehensive anthology of gay poetry about sex. Prudish boy-lovers might be embarrassed, since the poems are often about love, occasionally about romance, but always about sex - kissing, fondling, fucking, sucking and a host of interesting variations on that theme. The variety of voices "Badboy" hears on the subject of boy-love is as impressive as the number. And to find them chiming loudly in a chorus of gay writers celebrating all sorts of sex is refreshing. Order BBE, $7.50 O Tribe That Loves Boys, by Abu Nowas/Hakim Bey (Entimos Press, 48 pp) Hakim Bey extraordinary volume of works by Arab boy-love poet Abu Nowas is "a pseudo-translation made by a poet who doesn't know the original language." Instead of dry scholarship, Hakim relies on the passion he shares with a writer who lived half a world away 1200 years ago. The result is a collection of verse that boy-lovers will find at once wildly exotic end strangely familiar. Presented with a biographical essay recalling Nowas' outlandish antics in the service of both boys and poetry, the book is elegantly bound and printed in a limited edition, illustrated with photographs that share the spirit of the text. Order NOT, $15.50 Yes Is Such a Long Word, by Richard George Murray (Entimos Press, 46 pp) "Yes ls Such a Long Word" is a tiny, elegant book of very short poems by Richard George Murray. Where the "Badboy" collection scores with variety, George Murray's work explores one theme in depth. Even the few poems not explicitly about loving boys (which are mostly about loving cats!) seem to share the emotional ambiance of those that are. George Murray also sticks resolutely to the short form, often fitting more than one poem on a single page. Yet he's able to imbue a few short lines with impressive wit and warmth. The work opens up his world, so the brief poems invite readers to explore in their imaginations the pictures quickly sketched in the poet's scenarios. This is the kind of poetry book to bring smiles to people who don't generally care for poetry. Order GYI, $15.50 **TALES FROM AROUND THE WORLD** The Delight of Hearts, translated by E.A. Lacey (Gay Sunshine Press, 234 pp) Subtitled "what you will not find in any book," this anthology from the Arab Middle Ages was compiled by Ahmad al-Tifashi almost a thousand years ago. But with its focus on "strange facts, anecdotes and jokes," al-Tifashi's collection proves that camp was alive and well even then. Chapter headings (like "the wittiest and most refined poems about hustlers") make it immediately apparent this is no dry-as-dust history. In fact, the book is alive with smart-talking queens, wily hustlers, lecherous johns, love-sick poets, passionate boy-lovers and cowering closet cases. Order LDH, $16.50 Gay Tales of the Samurai, by Ihara Saikaku (Alamo Square Press Books, 110 pp) The samurai warriors of feudal Japan are legendary in the West for their courage, loyalty and strict devotion to the code of honor known as bushido. Less familiar to those who learned of bushido through movies chronicling the swordplay and intrigue of samurai life is the tradition of gay love between these fierce fighters and their adolescent pages or wakashu. The Japanese record of this courtly love, the way of shudo, extends back 300 years to Ihara Saikaku's "Glorious Tales of Homosexuality." "Gay Tales of the Samurai" features selections from Saikaku's books translated by E. Powys Mathers. Based on true stories handed down over generations, these accounts reveal both the yearning for ideal love and the dark samurai preoccupation with death, including the custom of seppuki, or ritual suicide by disembowelment. Order SGT, $11.50 Sexuality and Eroticism Among Males in Moslem Societies, by Arno Schmitt and Iehoda Sofer (Harrington Park Press, 201 pp) The Moslem world remains, for many Westerners, a very hidden, very foreign culture. Differences in notions about homosexual acts and gender roles can make relations among males difficult for outsiders to understand. This volume collects the impressions of both insiders and outsiders, relying on personal narratives and first-hand description as well as analytic essays and academic treatises. Together they provide a vivid and fascinating portrait of the erotic life of men in Islamic societies. Order SSE, $16.50 **VIDEOS** Abuse, directed by Arthur Bressan Arthur Bressan Jr.'s unconventional love story has now come to video. Abuse is the story of a student filmmaker who finds in a hospital emergency room the "star" for his documentary about child abuse. Thomas Carroll is a l4-year-old New Yorker savaged by sadistic parents. Ashamed to take showers after gym because of the cigarette burns that mark his chest, he reaches out for help to Larry Porter, a college student whose film project offers the boy a desperate chance for escape. When Larry and Thomas fall in love, however, both discover that building a life together holds challenges neither of them anticipated. Bresson's film, shot in black-and-white in 16mm, had only a limited theatrical release. The video release offers a first chance for many to view this uncompromising and original story. Order VAB, $75.00 Chicken Hawk, directed by Adi Sideman Your chance to view the film that sparked controversy wherever it was shown. Why did Newsday's reviewer call Chicken Hawk "frightening" ? Simply because, given the chance to present a point of view clearly, speakers from the North American Man/Boy Love Association made too much sense. No endorsement of boy-lovers, Ari Sideman's film gives NAMBLA's opponents ample time and takes a few cheap shots in editing and presentation. But the chance to hear boy-lovers, unmediated by indignant talk-show hosts and know-it-all "experts" is valuable. Nothing hides the obvious pride, sincerity and decency of men who risk harassment, prison and even death because they refuse to hide their love of boys. Order VCH, $40.00 Murmur of the Heart, directed by Louis Malle Murmur of the Heart is a poignant, romantic account of a boy's sexual initiation and his complex relationship with his vivacious mother. Young Laurent Chevalier is almost ready to leave the world of childhood, discovering with a sense of wonder both the pleasure and hypocrisy of adult life. Trapped on the cusp of manhood, the bright, sensitive boy is sent to recuperate from a heart murmur in a luxurious mountain spa. Witness to his confusion and fear, Laurent's mother provides a sensual expression of her love for her son as a gift to help him make a difficult transition. Told with humor and warmth, Murmur of the Heart is propelled by Benoit Ferreux's masterful performance as young Laurent. Almost banned by the French Movie Commission before it's release, the film was ultimately nominated for an Academy Award. Order VMH, $30.00 Olivier, Olivier, directed by Agnieszka Holland Olivier Olivier is based on a true story, a mystery that revolves around questions of love, family and truth. While cycling through the gentle countryside near his home in Provence, nine-year-old Olivier Duval disappeared. The loss of the child nearly destroyed the family, but his apparent reappearance six years later proves an even greater challenge. When a French policeman presents a 15-year-old Parisian street hustler as the Duval's missing child, his mother is willing to accept him without question. But Olivier's older sister doubts his identity, and her search for answers only raises troubling questions. Where does the truth lie: in the small scar that mark's the boy's smooth skin, or half remembered nursery rhymes? It's finally the teen's friendship with the young neighbor that provides the disturbing truth about Olivier's fate. Agnieszka Holland, director of Europa Europa draws a sleepily sensual performance from the teenage Olivier. Order VOO, $30.00 Spetters, directed by Paul VerHoeven Three Dutch youngsters face the decisions that come with the end of school days and the dawn of adult life. Drawn to the world of motorcycle racing, they dream of fame and fortune, they struggle with the small setbacks and genuine tragedy. When they meet an ambitious woman with plans of her own, new pressures afflict their friendships. And one of the boys is dealing with pressures all his own. Driven by fear and hatred to attack gay couples cruising the neighborhood where the friends hang out, he's forced to confront his real feelings about sexuality when he's the victim of a gang rape. "Spetters" is now out of print, and only a few copies remain available. Order VSP, $30.00 All prices include postage (by first-class or priority mail for customers in the United States, via printed matter for others). For express service via Federal Express, send $20 per order. Note: Federal Express will not deliver to post office boxes, and this service is not available to customers outside the United States. To avoid backorders, include a list of alternate titles or a note explaining you will accept our choice of substitutions. If you aren't happy with your choice of substitute, you can return it for full credit or a refund. If you are ordering magazines, let us know if you will accept alternate issues; if so, include a list of issues you already have so we won't duplicate them. Let us know titles you are looking for; we are always interested in expanding our inventory. Please allow four to six weeks for delivery. Ariel's Pages, PO Box 2487, New York, NY 10185-2487. Perhaps this will be useful or helpful for someone. Was it for you? M. LINK (includes comments/flames to Roy's post) https://groups.google.com/g/can.motss/c/cREKtj6gzMo [@nonymouse] [Guardster] [Proxify] [Anonymisierungsdienst] |